“Try, Try, Try” by The Smashing Pumpkins

"Try, Try, Try" closed the book on Machina/The Machines of God, the Smashing Pumpkins' fifth album, going out on September 11, 2000 as its third and last single. Billy Corgan wrote it, as he did its B-side, "Here's to the Atom Bomb", and produced it with Flood; the pair mixed it with Alan Moulder, and Howard Willing recorded it.

On Machina it's a big, crowded thing, stacked with piano, synth and electric guitar, while the alternate take on Machina II/The Friends & Enemies of Modern Music and the "Untitled" single strips it back to acoustic guitar and a looping keyboard figure. Vasily Kafanov covered the single's sleeve in alchemical symbols and nods to Christianity and Hermes Trismegistus, and the song later replaced "Landslide" on the international edition of Rotten Apples, the band's greatest hits.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.